With “Stealth Wear”, Hide from Unmanned Drones in Style

The dawn of the domestic drone is near. In 2015 more than 20,000 unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are expected to roam through the airspace of the United States alone. These unmanned drones, equipped with thermal imaging, video and audio recorders, may enable extreme levels of aerial invasion of privacy.

But as history has shown, whenever a government attempts increased surveillance, “rebellious” citizens often create counter-methods. One such counter-method to the rise of a “global surveillance society” is artist Adam Harvey’s Stealth Wear. Stealth Wear is a clothing line that is designed to challenge authoritarian surveillance systems like drones. It is a vision for fashion that addresses “the growing need to exert control over what we are slowly losing, our privacy”. With his “Anti-Drone Garments” Harvey hopes to give some privacy back to wearers by making them invisible to the thermal imaging cameras widely used by UAVs. Two of the three garments are modeled on traditional Muslim dress, perhaps as a commentary on drone warfare in parts of the Islamic world. It is yet to be seen if people are willing to wear these garments, but the statement of these garments is clear: In Privacy We Trust.